It's 1864 in this second Lizzie Martin Victorian mystery, following The Companion, and Lizzie leaves London for the south coast to be the companion of Lucy Craven, a teenager who lives in seclusion with her aunts and has recently lost an infant daughter to illness.

"When Lizzie arrives, she finds that her charge, Lucy Craven, insists that her daughter is still alive. When an itinerant rat catcher is found stabbed to death on the property, [Lizzie's beau Inspector Benjamin] Ross travels from London to assist the local police.... Told from both Lizzie's and Ross' points of view, the story is steeped in fascinating details of mid-1800s coastal England."—Booklist